Skepticism

EVENTS

Netroots Nation offering admission by poll?

Netroots Nation is the big progressive political conference sponsored by the gang at the Daily Kos. It’s being held in San Jose this year, at the end of June. They are opening the doors to their exhibition hall and giving 6 organizations free booth space — and among those vying for a slot is American Atheists. I would have thought they’d just give AA the space because progressives and atheists are such a natural match for each other…but no. They’ve decided that the way to determine who should get this space is by…an open, public, online poll.

Oh, we’ve got this.

Go take a look at the list of candidates for the free booth space. American Atheists is a natural, but I’ve got to say…there are a lot of worthy possibilities there. Wrestle with your conscience for a bit and vote for the one you like best.

Oooh, maybe we don’t have this. You people are always exercising your brains and thinking about your choices, and you might go haring off and voting with your mind rather than your shriveled little obedience gland.

It’s a nefarious mind-control device aimed at confining all social interaction to the internet so as to maximise your exposure to adverts and shitty flash-games. Mark Zuckerberg will take over the world! Muahahahaha!

I’m disappointed that Netroots is making themselves a part of the FB hegemony. Seriously? I can’t even sign in to Kos and vote? Because FB is such a wonderful, progressive organization, amirite?

From the contest page “Click on the organization or company’s Facebook “like” button below their listing to cast your vote. Your vote may also show up in your Facebook profile. Do not delete it or it will void your vote.”
From a technical standpoint, it looks like a good way to enforce “one-vote per person”, considering that Facebook do have a real-name only requirement (at least in the US).

I have two Facebook accounts, one for my real name, and one for this pseudonym. And I know plenty of people who’ve made facebook accounts for their cats. So basically, they lost control of the real name thing when they stopped requiring a .edu email address to register.

But even with my two accounts, I’m not sure I want to use a Facebook like to sing a petition. My real account if for real friendships with real people, including family and old friends I haven’t seen in years. I’ve not hidden my atheism on Facebook, and I don’t have that much trouble with people knowing that I “Like” American Atheists, but neither do I really want drama with anyone who might decide to argue with me about it. But more important is the principle of the thing. Facebook has removed the fine control ability where you could block a like or comment from appearing in your activity feed, and thus on your friends’ news feed, so now you can only completely delete the activity, negating your vote. Well that’s just shitty. There could be any number of organizations I’d like to vote for for any number of things, but it doesn’t mean I want to make them part of my Facebook profile and activity, which is something I maintain to keep in touch with my far flung family and friends in the way that I want to, not the way Facebook and Netroots Nation want me to.

You wouldn’t believe the number of places I don’t leave comments, the number of public posts on Facebook that I don’t like or comment on, simply because of this principle. Sadly, the stupid people still comment.